


lost in space

by ElisAttack



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff and Humor, Graves is painfully oblivious, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M, Magic, Magical Realism, Matchmaking Eldritch Horrors, and he gets a hug, but not HP universe magic, graves needs a hug, he gets many hugs, sex dreams courtesy of cosmic entities, things that are not normally sentient being sentient
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-21
Updated: 2017-12-22
Packaged: 2019-02-17 22:39:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13086894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElisAttack/pseuds/ElisAttack
Summary: Percival Graves is doing just fine.  He sold his shit condo, and he’s going back to work in a few short weeks.  He even found a nice enough place to live, with nice enough flatmates to live with.  As a bonus, the manager is a real handyman, and has eyes to drown in (but that’s another matter altogether), even though he doesn’t quite understand the concept of money, or personal space.It’s all great, except that the brownstone seems to exist in a subliminal place in reality and time, and the manager isn’t quite what he appears to be.Or the one where Graves needs a new place to live, the Goldsteins host dinner parties, Seraphina doesn’t deserve the nonsense she has to put up with, and Credence has a tendency to collect strays.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve got the flu, so you know what that means? It means it’s time for comedy, crack, fluff, and enough cold medicine so I can write said comedy, crack, and fluff

 

The ad in the paper says the brownstone sits on the middle of 44th, between 9th and 10th.  The posting is already a few weeks old, so Graves suspects the room must be taken.  It must be.  It's Manhattan, and the rent advertised is criminally low.

When he calls the number listed, an older woman with a creaky voice, like she’s been smoking like a chimney since she was eight, picks up the phone.  Strangely enough, asking about the third floor vacancy has her muttering doubts about there being a third floor in the first place. But she tells him to come by anyway, just in case.

In the end, he’s unable to that day.  There’s an incident while he’s getting ready for therapy.  As in, he’s the incident.  More specifically his foot awkwardly meeting the edge of the carpet is the incident.

Graves is only discharged from the hospital two days later.

Doctor Singh wanted to keep him under observation another day, but knew his insurance wouldn’t cover it.  Besides, the broken arm has nothing to do with the concussion that has him on leave.  Or the burn, while cooking the week before.  Or the lacerations, when he’s never before cut himself shaving.  Or the plethora of other injuries he seems to stumble into while in the condo.

Speaking of The Condo, Graves cautiously stops by to pick up a change of clothes.  His clothing is already packed in boxes, so he has to quickly dig around to find the right one.  In and out like a rabbit in fox territory.

He’s awkwardly pulling on a shirt when he smacks his broken arm against the wall.

Doctor Singh says the concussion is making him clumsy, Graves isn’t quite sure that’s it, but who is he to contradict a medical professional?

A train ride over, a short walk, and he stands in front of the brownstone.  It's tall, three stories high, and different from all its neighbors, as typical of brownstones in Manhattan.  Constructed back when houses were still built one at a time, it's a handsome building.  The fire escape is well-maintained, and the front stoop is swept clean.  Whomever the building manager is, Graves can tell they care about their job.

On the other hand, the cleanliness of the facade has Graves frowning.  The only possible explanation is that the building must be infested with black mold, why else would the rent be so low?

Graves walks up the steep steps, his cast throwing off his balance.  He stumbles once, but catches himself on the railing.  After that, the steps don’t seem nearly as steep, becoming easier to climb as he goes up.   _Huh_.

He rings the doorbell, and hears an answering “coming!”  Smoothing down his hair with his good hand, he waits patiently, wanting to make a good impression.  He can’t be blamed, he’s reached a point where he’s desperate enough to live with black mold than return to that damned condo.

The door swings open to reveal a blonde woman with grey eyes, and a smile wider than the Milky Way.  She’s beautiful, and definitely not the chain smoking woman who answered the phone.

“Well, hello there,”  she says in a twangy Metropolitan accent, looking him up and down,  “Honey, you look like shit,”  she says enthusiastically.

“Thanks,”  Graves says sarcastically.  He had neglected to take a shower, despite changing clothes.  The water would have been cold, and he wouldn’t have been able to find a plastic bag to wrap his cast.  Basically, he didn’t want to deal with his fucked up condo any more than he had to.  He probably still smells like old sweat, and hospital.  Fuck.  He should have at least put fresh deodorant on the one armpit he can still reach.

“I don't mean anything rude about it,”  she says,  “Just stating a fact.”

“Thanks,”  Graves repeats, with a weary sigh this time.  Graves remembers when he used to be the most dapper man at work.  He misses those days, painfully.

“Come on in then,”  she says, stepping aside to let him through,  “You're here for the room, yeah?  Miss Barebone said someone called.”

“Yes, that was me.”  Graves nods, walking in.  He notices a shoe rack: heels, and running shoes lined up all along the wallpapered wall.  The woman wears socks with little rubber duckies on them, and a pair of floppy slippers.  He bends and unlaces his brogues, difficult and undignified with only one hand, but he manages despite his creaking spine.  When he rises, the woman’s smile is just a tad bit brighter.

“So polite.  Oh, he's going to like you,”  she says cryptically, leading him past a staircase into a sitting room,  “I’m Queenie, by the way.”

“Percival Graves,”  he offers her his left hand with a sheepish smile.  Unphased, she shakes it.  “Call me Percy.”

“Percy.”  She smiles, trying out his name on her tongue.  “Like the explorer that went looking for a lost city in South America.”

“I guess?”  Graves says, though he was named after his uptight grandfather.

“He never found the city,”  she says, leaning closer, and whispering conspiringly,  “He found something better.”  She winks.

“Uh,”  Graves says.

“But, never mind that now.”  She lifts a single finger.  “Wait here, I’ll go get him.”

“Him?”

“Credence, the manager.  He posted the ad,”  she says,  “I assume you’ve brought references, and a deposit?”

“Yes, of course.”  He gestures to the messenger bag at his side.  He brought a letter from Seraphina, outlining his many good qualities in a few short sentences.

She’d frowned when he mentioned he was selling the condo, but ultimately understood why he was doing it.  It didn’t feel like home anymore, what with all the injuries, and the nightmares refusing to leave him alone.  The meds help, but he knows a change of scenery would do better for his recovery.

He only has one reference, since... surprise surprise, he doesn’t actually have friends.  A result of a combination of his previously intimidating dapperness, and—though he would never admit it—uptightness.  Seraphina isn’t even his friend, she’s his boss—or at least, was his boss.  He’s still on leave.

“You won’t need them.”  Queenie goes over to the staircase.  She skips the first step, then the third, and says, as if it explains everything,  “He’s a good judge of character.”

She disappears up the creaking stairs, leaving Graves alone with two leather couches, a well maintained persian rug, an unlit fireplace, and a wall of bookcases.

There’s a strange noise coming from the walls.  It’s a steady beat, like the thrumming of a human heart.  It’s not loud enough to be annoying, but now that he’s alone, it’s noticeable.  If he moves in, he’ll have someone look at the boiler, it sounds like it’s on the fritz.

Graves crosses the room to the bookcases, reading over the titles.  This must be a common room, because the collection of books is eclectic to say the least.

It’s arranged by subject, not alphabetically; a variant of the dewey decimal system, but personalized by whomever arranged it.  Books that should be fiction are placed among non-fiction like they belong, and there’s no separate section for different languages: a book with pictographs on the cover sits beside one written in a slavic language.  He touches the spine of _Abnormal Psychology of the Common Cosmic Squid_ finding it damp, and freezing to the touch.

“Huh,”  he says, running his fingers along the other books, all the while wondering what kind of irresponsible building manager would refuse a deposit from a potential tenant.  Graves turns, and just about jumps out of his skin.

A man stands there, looking like he’s been watching Graves for a questionably long time.

“Jesus h. Christ, you scared me,”  Graves starts, clutching at his chest where his heart hammers away.  He didn’t even hear the stairs creak.

He studies the man.  He’s taller than him by a few inches, with long, black hair to his shoulders, holding a bit of a wave to it.  He’s wearing clothes right out of the Victorian era, waistcoat and cravat included, channeling that starving Romantic poet aesthetic.  Considering all the poetry on the shelves behind him, he’s living it too.

The man’s eyes are a dark matte, a black velvet Graves wishes he could sink his fingers into.  He looks at Graves through that long curtain of hair, shoulders hunched.

“Credence, right?”  Graves asks, stepping closer and holding out his hand.  The man smells strange.  Like wet pennies, and what Graves imagines lightning smells like.  It’s not bad, but it is different.  He wonders what detergent he uses.

Credence takes his fingers, skin warm and dry to the touch.  He holds the tips of them for a second, then lets go.

“It’s nice to meet you,”  Graves says, fumbling with the latch of his bag, pulling out the newspaper with some wrangling.

He found the listing on his bed while he was packing.  Graves hadn’t bought the paper in a while, so he figured Seraphina must have dropped it when she brought over some case files, prepping for his eventual return to work.  How it ended up on his bed though, he’ll never know.

Handing it to Credence, he asks,  “Is the room still free?”

Credence nods, then waves his hand, a gesture for him to follow.  Like Queenie, Credence hops over the first step, steps onto the second, then jumps the third.  He turns and watches Graves, who follows suit, even though his fucked up arm must look ridiculous, like a floppy chicken wing tucked in a sling.  Credence smiles softly, however, leaving him feeling like he passed a test.

“The room is on the third floor,”  Credence says, and it’s the first thing he’s ever said to Graves.  His voice is soft, but his words pronounced, so he can hear everything said despite the low cadence.  “You’ll have your own bathroom, but the kitchen is downstairs, and communal,”  he explains.  Strangely, his steps don’t have the floorboards creaking like Queenie’s did.

Graves studies his back as they climb.  He does not look a day over twenty five: young for a building manager.  A student hired by the owner, maybe?

“The Goldsteins—Queenie, and her sister, Tina—have the second floor to themselves,”  he points to a door when they reach a landing.  “You’ll get a dinner invite every once in a while.  If Queenie’s cooking, feel free to go.  If Tina’s, I advise that you have someplace else to be that night.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,”  Graves says wryly, as they turn the corner, and ascend another set of stairs.

“You’ll meet the other tenants soon enough,”  Credence says, padding along.  Graves thinks he catches a glimpse of garters holding up black socks.  The guy’s committed to his look, that’s for sure.

“I haven’t seen the room yet,”  Graves says, amused.

“You’ll take it,”  Credence says, quite certain of himself, and stops in front of a door.  Another lies at the other end of the hall, and there’s a set of stairs going up a floor, even though the building only has three stories, excluding the basement.

Something moves out of the corner of his eye, but when he looks up the stairs, there’s nothing there but a door bathed in shadows.  He rubs at his temple.  Great, he’s going to have to tell Doctor Singh that the meds are making him see things.

“Here it is,”  Credence says, watching him silently.  He leans on the knob, holding the door open so Graves can look into the room beyond.

Something heavy sits in the bottom of his throat.  He swallows, tears gathering in his eyes.  It looks... it looks so much like _her_ old room.  A four poster bed hung with red velvet drapes, a dressing table, a screen in the corner, freshly waxed floors.  Sunlight streams in through the two windows, lighting everything brightly, and Graves can just see the corner of a clawfoot tub through an open door across the room.

“Fuck,”  he swears, looking back at Credence in disbelief.

Credence chuckles, a low sound in his chest.  “I told you.  You’ll take it.”

***

“My reference,”  Graves says, handing over the sealed envelope, holding out another with money,  “And the deposit.”

Credence takes the letter, but turns away from the money, walking into the kitchen.  He pulls a kettle from the cupboard, the old kind that whistles when it boils, and takes down a set of mugs.

“Hey,”  Graves says with a frown,  “Why won’t you take the deposit?”

Credence fills water from the sink, then sets the kettle on the stove to boil.  He briefly glances over at Graves, then opens another cupboard, taking out two tea bags.  “Don’t need one from you,”  he says.

Graves purses his lips, folding his arms over his chest.  “What if I trash the room?”

Credence raises a single brow.  “Will you trash the room?”

He thinks of the room.  Of what a privilege it would be to live in such a beautiful place, one that reminds him of a home that no longer exists, and a mother that lies twenty years dead in the ground.  He shakes his head.  He couldn’t, even if he wanted to.

“That’s why I won’t take a deposit.”

“That’s a bad business model,”  Graves points out.

“Good thing I don’t run a business,”  Credence says just at the kettle whistles.  He takes it off the stove, and pours water in both mugs.  The smell of malty black tea drifts over to his nose.

Credence holds out one of the mugs, and Graves shakes his head.  “I don’t like tea.”

“It’s not for you,”  he says, stepping to the side, and handing it to someone behind him.  He turns, finding a elderly woman with knobby knees, and calculating eyes.  She sips at her tea, pinky in the air, even though it’s a mug.

“You’re a skinny one, aren’t you?”  She says, eyeing him like he’s a piece of meat.  Graves doesn’t quite know what to say.  “That won’t last, Queenie will fatten you up just right.”

“I have dietary restrictions,”  Graves says weakly, thinking of his meds.

“Jewish?”  She asks,  “You’re in luck, the Goldsteins keep kosher.”

He clears his throat, nervously.  “Not Jewish, no.”

She hums.  “Hindu, then?”

“What?”  Graves says, surprised.  “No.”

Her eyes narrow sharply, and she hisses the next word like it’s a cuss.  “Vegan?”

He blinks slowly.  “My bag is leather, my belt is leather.”  He gestures down his body.  His shoes are also leather but he’s not wearing them right now.  “Besides, what’s wrong with veganism?  It’s a perfectly respectable way of life, good for the environment.”  Graves is trying not to think about the fact that he’s arguing with a woman with a flower tucked in her white hair, wearing a cashmere cardigan.

“Leave him alone, Modesty,”  Credence says, sipping his tea all blasé and collected.  To Graves he says,  “She grew up during the depression, she’s very particular about my tenants eating right.”

Graves thinks she doesn’t look a day over sixty.  Dermatologists must hate her.

“Hey, fuck you, Credence,”  she says with a scowl, then to Graves,  “Give me a list of what you can’t eat, and I’ll get it sorted out with Queenie.”

“I thought the kitchen was shared?”  He asks, confused.

“It was, but then Tina set it on fire.  The situation has changed,”  Modesty says pointing to a set of scorch marks that he only just noticed above the toaster.  She glares at Credence who looks off to the side, scratching at something under the sleeve of his shirt.  “Credence likes to give people the benefit of the doubt, I’m not as forgiving.”

Graves stares down at his shoes, ashamed.  “I can’t afford a meal plan,”  he mutters.  Between the medical bills not covered by insurance, his mortgage, and the fact that he has no income, the money from the sale of his condo will run out in a few short months.  He has to be cleared for work as soon as possible, and needs to avoid any unnecessary expenses.

“Food is included in rent,”  Credence cuts in quickly.

That... is frankly ridiculous.  Food in Manhattan is expensive, and with the pitance he’s being charged for rent, Credence would be losing money.  Graves cannot, with a clear conscience, agree to it.

Except, he does exactly that.

What choice does he have?

***

He gives Credence his move in date, and is back at the condo before sundown.

The front door slams closed behind him—nearly on his fingers—loud in the silence that hangs heavy in the air.  It’s so quiet, it’s always been quiet, but nowadays it’s pronounced.  He finds himself missing the thrum of the brownstone’s boiler.  It feels so alive compared to this.

Tossing his keys on the counter, they keep on going until they end up clattering to the floor.  With a grimace he goes to pick them up, shivering.  His life lies in boxes packed up, and ready to go.  He wanted to ask Credence if he could move in tomorrow, but didn’t want to seem too eager.  Doing that would have made him look destitute, no matter that living in the condo feels exactly like he is.

It’s cold, the thermostat doesn’t work for him anymore.  It works for other people, but not for him.  When he called the electrician a while back, she said nothing was wrong with it.  She’d turned it on, then for a few blessed minutes heat poured from the vents.  He had reveled in it, happy that it was all just in his head, until the moment she left, and the heater turned off with an ominous click.

The water runs cold for him, and only him.  When Seraphina had come over, she used his bathroom.  Graves had asked if the warm water was still off, lying and saying that the superintendent was doing repairs.  When in reality the water had been running cold for weeks.  She said the temperature was just right.

It’s like the condo is trying to make his life as miserable as possible, and only his.  As strange as it sounds, he’s tired of fighting with it, especially after the concussion.  He’s given up.  It sold over asking, which is at least one good thing on top of the shitshow that is currently his life.

The condo seems to like the buyer, and good riddance.  He’s glad to be rid of it.

Graves pulls a blanket from the box marked “bedroom,” curls up on the carpet that tripped him, and tries to get some sleep.  The vents pour out a steady stream of cold air that somehow manages to work its way under his blanket, and through his clothes.

Wrapping his arms tighter around himself only seems to make it worse.

Fuck his life.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whomever invented chicken soup with kneidlach is a god among humans.

Queenie shows up at his door three days later in a fur coat, and sheath dress.  A Trekkie stands behind her, and a woman with a bob cut and peacoat three sizes too big stands beside the Trekkie, looking to be the most normal out of the three of them.

“Yes?”  He asks cautiously.  His focus is stuck on the Trekkie, or at least that’s what Graves thinks he is; he’s never watched an episode of Star Trek in his life.

The guy’s got on a turtleneck that looks as though it’s made from a mustard coloured vinyl, and long flowing grey robes that sparkle like sequins are woven into the fabric.  It’s a Look, that’s for sure.

How he managed to get past Freddie the doorman, former MMA fighter extraordinaire, wearing what he’s wearing is the question of the hour.

“We’re here to get you moving!”  Queenie does some sort of jazz hands that nearly gouge out the Trekkie’s eyes.  The guy takes it good naturedly enough, smiling brightly for less than half a second, then letting his face return to median as if that alone took too much effort.

Queenie pushes past him into the condo.  “Moving days are the best days,”  Queenie says enthusiastically.  Graves strongly disagrees.  “You get to hang with your friends, eat pizza, and goof around.  So much fun!”

Graves gets the feeling that she’s never helped someone move before.

Queenie gasps all of a sudden, and Graves wonders if the condo is finally trying to kill someone other than him.

“Oh, where are my manners!”   _Damn_ , it’s still just him.  “My sister, Tina.”  She points to the peacoat clad woman examining his thermostat with a critical eye.  “And her paramore,”  she makes a noise that’s just a series of unrelated syllables in a row,  “But that can be hard to pronounce, you can just call him Newt.”

 _Newt_ has got the cupboard under the kitchen sink open, and he’s crouched on all fours looking inside, so all Graves can see of him is the wriggling of his behind in the air.  And what a nice behind it is.  Unfortunately, Newt emerges and catches him looking.  Graves looks to the ceiling and pretends he wasn’t checking out his future flatmate’s partner.  

Newt waves him closer, and stupidly Graves goes.  “I see why you want to move out,”  Newt whispers conspiratorially,  “The building recently changed management, and the new manager is not so friendly to your kind.”

Graves doesn’t know whether to be offended, or ask how he can tell the management is homophobic just from looking under the sink.

“The manager hasn’t changed,”  Graves says instead, confused.

Jim was in the lobby swabbing the marble just last week, though he’d looked a little worse for wear.  When Graves had called out a greeting, his head had whipped around so fast it looked like his skin forgot to come along for the ride.  His nose had seemed slit-like, but then Graves had blinked, and everything was right again. That is, until Jim made some sort of buzzing-hissing noise, which, Graves didn’t know humans could make sounds like that.  Also, his bucket was empty of water, and the mop wasn’t wet. He was swabbing with a dry mop, pushing the dirt around, and he didn’t even notice.

Graves has lived through a few hangovers like that.

Newt waggles his fingers.  “That’s what The Snake wants you to think.  They’ve never been fond of law enforcement.”

“Ready to go?”  Queenie calls out, voice slightly muffled, distracting him from whatever Newt meant by _that_.  Graves glances over his shoulder, and is about to ask if she brought a handcart, but double takes, his mouth falling open.

“What the fuck?”  Graves mutters under his breath.  The living room is empty.  All his boxes gone, vanished, _poof_ , like they never existed.  He stalks out of the kitchen, and pokes his head into the hallway, nearly getting his head taken off by the door in the process.  But his stuff isn’t there either.

“We took it all over to the brownstone while you were chatting with Newt,”  Queenie says with a brilliant smile, holding a slice of pizza dotted with black olives.  “The MTA’s not very crowded this time of day.”

 _Chatting_.  They exchanged less than five sentences between the two of them.  Their conversation couldn’t have been more than a minute long.  There’s no way, no way at all.  Except the proof is lying right in front of him.  Tina shuffles from foot to foot, and Graves stares at her with narrowed eyes.  She doesn’t seem like a good liar, and apparently also doesn’t know what napkins are for.

 _The MTA_...

“Do you want some alone time before you leave?  Some places, they just grow on you, you know?”  Queenie giggles.  “It can be sad to watch them go.”

Graves would rather… do anything else.  He does not want be alone in this condo, ever again.  He knows it’s going to try killing him one last time for posterity's sake.

He shakes his head.  “Let’s go,”  he says, and that’s when the light fixture falls on his head.

***

He’s got Newt’s vinyl hanky pressed to his forehead as he walks up to the brownstone.  It’s not doing much, absorption wise, but it smells a whole bunch like menthol, it’s a nice scent, and so Graves can ignore the fact that it’s just sliding the blood all around.  What kind of Trekkie costume involves a vinyl hanky, anyway?

Tina’s got an arm around his waist, helping him along.  She offered to carry him, then quickly retracted the offer at the look on his face.  She’s still got mustard around her mouth, and Graves is feeling grumpy enough not to tell her.

Limping up the three steps it takes to reach the front door, he remembers it being a much longer climb.

If he’s got another concussion he’s going to punch something.  Like his old condo, he’d really like to punch it, no matter that it’d just skin his knuckles.  The satisfaction alone would be worth it.

The door swings open to a foyer full of his boxes.  He left his old IKEA furniture behind, figuring the modernist lines would look terrible next to that glorious four poster bed.

“Just leave them in the foyer, Credence will take them up,”  Queenie says, kicking off her shoes.

“By himself?”  he asks, horrified.  He has three boxes full of hardcover books, weighing at least a tonne each, not to mention the boxes containing all his suits.  He doesn’t know how Queenie and Tina managed them on the MTA, handcart or not.

Newt leans over and whispers in his ear, “Books stay downstairs.  Put labels on them if you’re afraid of mixups.”

“Why?”  Graves asks, baffled.

“Sharing is caring,”  he says with a deadpan expression, breathing against the shell of his ear, vinyl squeaking.

He’s beginning to understand why the rent is so low.

“...Alright,”  Graves says. He folds up Newt’s bloodied hanky and gives it back to him.  He doesn’t even look disgusted, and puts it back in his pocket, Graves’ blood still smeared all over it.

He gets his shoes off without falling over, and goes over to the pile of boxes, searching for… there it is.  He tugs open the one with “books” scribbled on the side, and begins pulling them out, stacking them up in a pile on the rug in the common room.  It takes an awful long time with only one hand, but he manages.

By the times he’s got all his books out of their respective boxes, the Goldsteins have disappeared up the stairs, and Newt’s in the kitchen, rummaging around in the fridge.  Modesty appears out of a room attached to the kitchen, and falls onto one of the leather couches, it squeaks beneath her.

Her white hair has a tinge of blue to it, and Graves is dying to ask if she dyes it when she says,  “Better be careful, boy, Credence is real particular about his classification system.  You wouldn’t want to piss him off.”

Before he started, Graves found a stack of little blue stickers on the fireplace mantel, and is currently placing one on each of his books, right over the barcode so they don’t cover anything important.  He’s got them organized by subject, though most of them are true crime, with a few forensic journals thrown in.

“Tell me about him?”  He requests, just as the phone rings.

“Bring that horn here, and I’ll tell you anything you want.”  She points across the room to a curvy console table, an old rotary dial phone on top.  It’s not wireless, but it has a long cord, and when he brings it to her, there’s no resistance.  Walking past the foyer, he finds all his boxes gone. Graves marvels at Credence’s ability to sneak around without anyone noticing.

Modesty chats on the phone with someone bearing an equally Puritan name.  It strikes him as strange that Modesty and Credence both have very similar names.  They don’t look alike, but they might still be related, genetics works in funny ways.

He’s studying the shelves, thinking about where his true crime volumes would fit best when Modesty hangs up the phone, placing it at her feet.  “What do you want to know?”  She asks with a yawn, stretching her arms over her head.

Credence has a copy of Hobbes’ _Leviathan_ , which is about as close to true crime as his collection gets.  If Graves moves everything after _Leviathan_ a shelf over, he should be able to make everything fit.

“Is he your grandson?”  Graves asks, conversationally.  Modesty chokes, and Graves shoots her a worried look.  She clutches her side, wheezing through a bout of hysterical laughter.

“Definitely not.”  A strand of hair falls onto her face, and she sweeps it back, hand mottled with old age.  “Credence doesn’t have any family, at least not on this plane.   He’s been taking care of me for years.”  She chuckles.  “If I were to define our relationship... I guess I think of him as a brother.”  She smiles a soft, private smile.  “A big brother, with a big heart.”

A pipe gurgles, and the walls seem to rumble.  Graves notices that someone lit the fireplace, and it’s steadily warming up the room, chasing away any trace of chill.

“Everyone loves him, you know?”  She says, looking at him sternly.  “He’s easy to love, but he’s also easy to hurt.”  She stands up, and thrusts the phone into his arms.  “Don’t hurt him.”

***

The back of his head thumps against the edge of the porcelain tub.  He hasn’t had a bath this pleasant in months.

Credence didn’t just bring his boxes upstairs, he unpacked them as well.  Graves should see it as a gross violation of his privacy, but Credence put everything in its right place, saving him the trouble.

His suits are all organized in the wardrobe by fabric type, then colour, exactly how he does it.  His shirts are all folded properly, and tucked in a drawer. His socks are paired off and folded into the toe end to prevent the elastic from stretching out.  Credence even rolled his underwear into neat little sausages, which on top of embarrassing him, has him blushing like a teenager.

Credence had organized all his toiletries on the bathroom stand, but didn’t touch the bag with his meds, which he’s grateful for.  His beard trimmer sits on the counter, plugged in, charging, since he can’t use his safety razor with only one hand.  His toothbrush has a cover on it, because he’s a little bit germaphobic like that.

Somehow Credence knew, and it he did it all without being asked, making Graves feel like the guiltiest shithead alive for how few zeros were on the check he wrote this morning.

He scratches at his cast, the plastic it’s wrapped in makes a crinkling noise in the quiet bathroom.

“Do you like the bubbles?”

Graves jerks in surprise, and his head slips under the water.  He emerges sputtering, gathering the bubbles to his chest.  Kicking out his legs he turns in the bath and glares at Credence who stands in the doorway.  He has no concept whatsoever of boundaries.

“How’d you get in here?”  He demands, flushing to the tops of his cheeks, thanking God and the Devil as well that the bubbles haven’t yet dispersed.  They’re lasting an awful long time, considering he’s been soaking in the tub for over half an hour.  His toes and fingers are all wrinkly, but the water is still as hot and foamy as ever.

Credence walks over to a stand above the toilet, stuffing an armful of fluffy towels into its shelves.  “I have a key,”  he says, straight-faced.  He doesn’t even have the decency to check Graves out.

He sighs, scratching again at the itch he can’t reach beneath the cast.  He’s actually happy that Credence isn't looking at him.  It helps him remember that he isn’t on display for the world to gawk at.  He lost a lot of muscle weight after the concussion, and he’s ashamed of how far he let himself go.  At forty, he’s not the man he used to be, but that’s no excuse.

Now that he’s able to take warm showers in the morning, he should get back into the habit of jogging.  Maybe he could ask Credence along, he looks like he could use a break from running the brownstone.

“Dinner’s in ten,”  Credence says.

Graves closes his eyes, sinking further into the water.  “Some other time,”  he sighs,  “Save me something, yeah?  Just no-”

“Fish, I know,”  he says quietly.

Graves doesn’t hear him go, but something tickles the skin under his cast, and the persistent itch goes away.  When he opens his eyes, Credence is nowhere to be seen, but he thinks he sees something dart away out of the corner of his eye.

***

His first morning in the brownstone starts out innocently enough.

He comes down the stairs, skipping the third, and first from the bottom.  Yawning, he’s got his case files tucked under his good arm.  Queenie’s in the kitchen wearing an apron covered in frills, cooking up a storm while Tina sits at the breakfast table, her face in a bowl of cereal.

Graves pours himself a cup of black coffee, and sits down.  Queenie automatically slides a fully cooked omelet onto a plate, right next to a grilled cheese sandwich, and places it in front of him.

“Credence told me you were up,”  she says with a wink.  Graves doesn’t bother commenting on the impeccable timing, just digs in.  It’s been a little less than a day, but living in this house has already normalized all sorts of crazy shit.  At least the food is good.

His plate is scraped clean, and he’s on his second cup when Credence shows up.

He appears to materialize in the kitchen like a ghost.  One day Graves is going to unearth his sneaky secret: how he manages to just show up anywhere in the brownstone without making a noise.

Credence grabs a pineapple from the counter, then walks out of the kitchen with it.  Graves thinks he sees him take a bite out of it, skin and all, as he’s climbing up the stairs, but his eyes must be playing tricks on him.

He’s curled up on the couch going over his case files, breaking up the reading into bits, then going over them in short installments, so he doesn’t get a migraine.  The concussion is still playing havoc on his ability to focus, even though it’s been months.

Tina sits on the other couch, her face buried in _A Death in Belmont_ , when Newt bursts in through the front door, wearing what could only be described as a space suit on fire.

He makes a beeline straight for the bookshelves, waddling along in his space boots, trailing smoke behind him as he goes.  Tina doesn’t even look up.  She turns a page and continuous reading, while Graves sits on the couch, clutching the case files to his chest, eyes wide.

Newt runs his fingers along the spines, then pulls a book out.  He flips through the pages, uncaring that the pack on his back is on fire.  His once white space suit is black with soot, the glass of his helmet is cracked in many places, and has Graves mentioned that he’s _on_ _fire_?

Graves just about falls off the couch in his rush to the kitchen, opening cupboards as he goes, but he can’t find a fire extinguisher anywhere.  Finally, he opens a broom closet off to the side, and finds one tucked in among all the cleaning supplies.  Just as Newt exclaims, “Ah ha!”  Graves turns the extinguisher onto him, and blows a puffy cloud of foam all over his back, putting out the fire.

Newt doesn’t even notice, he closes the book, and puts it back in its place.  Muttering something about lactose intolerance he pushes past Graves into the kitchen.  He digs around in the fridge while Graves stares on numbly. He emerges with a carton of soy milk in hand.

He pats Graves on the back, rushes over to Tina who turns her face up for a peck, eyes still glued on the book.  Back out the front door he goes, closing it with a gentle click.

Credence appears then.  He takes the fire extinguisher from Graves, checking the gauge, he says,  “Hmm, needs to be recharged.”

“Wait,”  Graves calls out weakly before he has a chance to leave the kitchen.  Credence turns back, a brow raised, extinguisher cradled in his arms like it’s a baby.  Graves swallows.  “Would you like to come jogging with me tomorrow morning?”

Credence doesn’t even hesitate.  “Can’t,”  he says simply, going through the door that leads to Modesty’s room, leaving Graves feeling like a total schmuck.

***

With a mug of hot cocoa in hand, he climbs the last flight of stairs to his room.  He knows now that he shares the floor with Newt, who lives on the other side of the hall.  He keeps some sort of animal in his room, Graves can sometimes hear the pitter patter of its feet on the floor, scampering about.  Credence seems to be fine with it, but Newt  still never brings it into the common areas.

He’s fumbling with his keys when something at the top of the next flight of stairs catches his eye.  It looks to be a lump of fabric, something dark, and velvety.

Graves decided a few days ago that the stairs must lead to the roof, because there’s no way another floor could fit in the brownstone.

He cradles the mug in the crook of his elbow, then opens his door.  Placing his cocoa on his desk, he leaves his room, shutting the door behind him.

Someone must have dropped their laundry, Credence, probably, since he favours darker outfits.  It’s a bit too cold to be hanging it outside, but he imagines the creaking dryer in the basement uses an excess amount of electricity.

Credence is a strange fellow, to say the least, but he’s not the strangest person living in the brownstone.  Over the past two weeks Graves has gotten to know his flatmates _painfully_ well.

Queenie likes spending all her time in the kitchen, and with her boyfriend who apparently owns a bakery straight out of the forties.  She showed Graves a black and white photo of him once.  Hair slicked back with brylcreem, and a smile bright enough to set the world on fire, Jacob Kowalski looks like a comely fellow.  In the photo he leans on one of those fat bodied cars that made the forties such a distinct time.  Like Credence, he seems obsessively into the era he’s emulating.

He learned Tina has a pretty good eye for investigating.  She almost always correctly guesses the ending of any crime book she reads, and can be pretty persistent when she wants to be.  Graves is thinking about picking up an academy application for her.  She’d do well in the NYPD.

Modesty has a talent for scaring the ever living shit out of him.  One morning he came into the kitchen to find her playing five finger fillet with Queenie’s paring knife while a captivated Newt watched on, bending over and writing in a notebook every once in a while.

Newt… Newt is another matter altogether.  If Graves thought the incident with the soy milk was strange, the thing with the octopus and toilet plunger was even weirder.  Graves shudders.  He doesn’t like thinking about it.

He climbs the final step, to find nothing.  No pile of clothing, no velvet whatever he was hoping to see.  He’s strangely disappointed.

Graves is about to turn around and head back down, when he hears a low groaning sound coming from the other side of the door.  Immediately his face floods red, it sounds so much like a man… well…

Newt’s at work, doing whatever he does to make a living, so that leaves Credence.  Credence is on the other side of that door.  On the roof, doing something that’s making him groan like that.

He puts his ear to the door.  His face is burning, and he hasn’t felt this ashamed of himself since he told Doctor Singh he believed his condo was trying to kill him.

The keening gasp he hears next could be a man reaching the throes of pleasure, but it also reminds him of that time he was in Big Sur—back when his mom was still alive—and he decided to go whale watching.

He’d been on this tiny powerboat with twenty other people, all crammed together wearing yellow life jackets.  They were all soaked through, but no one cared. The whales were vocalizing, and the sounds they made were so loud above the water.  At the time he thought,  _ that’s what the universe sounds like _ .  Of course, he was high as all fuck, but the sentiment is still true.

A rattle sounds, then a thump, and Graves can’t take it any longer.  He flings open the door to see, not Credence, but a great cloud of black smoke undulating in the middle of a dusty attic, sparks of red glowing in its centre.

It seems to freeze when it notices him, looking about as startled as a cloud of smoke can look.  He stares at it for a long moment, and it stares back, and there’s just a whole lot of staring going on for a thing that has no eyes, but then the knob’s flying out of his grasp, and the door is slamming right in his face.

“What are you doing up here?”  Credence hisses through clenched teeth, crowding him back against the door. He’s pressing so close their chests are touching, and Graves can’t seem to think beyond that fact.

“Uh,”  Graves says intelligently, pointing over his shoulder.  “I think your attic’s on fire.”

“It’s _fine_ ,”  Credence says hastily, eyes flicking to the door before he begins pulling on his sleeve.  “Come down from there.”

Graves looks over his shoulder as they walk down the stairs, stumbling into Credence once, then twice, before deciding he’d better concentrate on watching his step.

“Um, what is that?”  Graves asks when Credence finally lets go of his sleeve, as they stand in front of his room.

Credence’s eyes narrow, and he glances back up the stairs.  “Nothing you have to be worried about,”  he says, then out of nowhere he steps into Graves’ space, wrapping his arms around his neck.  “Drink your cocoa, forget what you saw,”  he murmurs into his ear, letting go, and leaving him to do just that.

His cocoa is still steaming when he picks it up.

The next morning the stairs have disappeared, along with the attic door.  When he asks Newt about them, he gets a shifty look in return, before he quickly changes the subject.

Graves books an appointment with Doctor Singh right after breakfast.  He really needs to get his meds switched.

***

He calls Seraphina that night.  Even though they’re definitely not friends, there’s no rule that says he can’t phone his boss to complain about his flatmates.

“I’m living with crazy people,”  he says, the moment she picks up,  “Either that, or I’m going insane.”

“Oh, tell me more,”  she says.  So he does.

“Hmm,”  she says after he finishes complaining, and Graves can hear the faint sound of a pen on paper, he’d bet a million bucks that she’s still at work even though it’s a quarter after midnight.  To think people used to call  _ Graves _ a workaholic.  “It does sound like you’re off your rocker,”  she says vacantly, pen scratching away even harder.

“Listen,”  he says nervously when he hears a small snap, a curse, then the jingle of Seraphina rummaging through the mug on her desk for a new pen,  “You sound busy, I’m going to let you go.”

“Fine,”  she grumps,  “But I’m coming by tomorrow to arrest the more questionable ingrates you’re shacking up with.”  A frustrated huff, and then she’s saying,  “Goodnight, Percy.”

“Night, Sera.”

Graves lets the phone fall from his ear, and it bounces on the bed, coming to a rest right at the edge of his bed.  In the old condo it would have rolled right off, and smashed on the floor.  Graves has to remember that.  Anything, even his slow descent into madness, is better than living in that hell.

He rubs at his forehead, and sits up.  Someone is playing the goddamned Bee Gees at a quarter after midnight.  Graves climbs off his bed and crosses the room to the bathroom.  There’s a small gap between the brownstone and its neighbour.  Barely enough room to push a wheelie bin through, and definitely enough for sound to carry like a bitch.

Graves pulls up the blinds and pushes open the bathroom window.  He looks across the way and sees what appears to be a party swinging full blast.  It’s some sort of disco theme night because there are afros galore; an actual disco ball; eye burning neons; bell bottoms; and too many men with the questionable combination of chest hair, and v-necks that stretch all the way to their belly buttons.

He’s stunned speechless for one short moment before he’s yelling across the way,  “Hey! Turn down the fucking music, some of us have work in the morning!” Well, he doesn’t have work, but he’s sure someone else in the neighbourhood does.

For his trouble, he gets a pornstached man smoking two joints at both corners of his mouth, giving him the finger with both hands.  Years ago, that would have been him, minus the pornstache.  Fuck, he feels old.

He flips the bird right back, and slams down the window in anger.

Then, quiet.  There’s no more music.  There’s only the sound of the brownstone, the walls inhaling and the floors settling, the flow of blood through the pipes.  He looks out the window, and the apartment across is vacant, a for lease sign taped to the window.  No more disco ball, no more music, no more partygoers, just an empty room inside an emptier apartment.

Yup, it’s official, he’s gone right off the deep end.

***

He dreams.

_The sheets are soft on his bare back, and the weight along his front is comforting like the caress of a warm ocean.  He smells pennies when Graves tucks his nose behind an ear, the thrum of a heartbeat that sounds like second nature by now.  Pushing fingers through that endless softness, he tugs, and it follows him down._

_He presses kisses to a soft mouth as he floats along in space, weightless.  He clutches at it, and feels something give.  Sinking deeper into that weightlessness, a caress moves all along his skin, raising goosebumps in its wake.  A mouth nibbles at his pectoral, another bites at his neck, a tongue traces along the shape of his ear, teeth grazing the backs of his knees.  He throws back his head in abject pleasure._

_He gasps, opening his eyes to a void, a nothingness that feels anything but empty.  A deep smoky black surrounds him, intertwined with red.  Warm, comforting, like a fire on a cold day, a mug of hot cocoa.  He squeezes his eyes shut, then opens them again, and stars surround, filling the void with their distant light._

_It presses its smoke to his stomach, and tells him to close his eyes, so he does.  It takes him into its warmth, and brings him release like he’s never experienced before._

Graves wakes to sticky sheets, and a vague memory of someone calling his name.

***

Seraphina rings the doorbell in the morning, and Graves gets up from the kitchen table to let her in.  Credence drinks a mug of tea, sitting in the chair opposite.  All morning he’s been staring down at that mug, only looking up once, during which he caught Graves’ eye, and turned an unbelievable shade of fuschia.

Graves wonders if it was something he said.

Seraphina walks in with her head held high, eyeing the brownstone with a critical eye.  When everything seems to be in order, according to whatever Seraphina considers order, she pulls him into a hug.  He’s surprised enough by it, that he doesn’t return the embrace, and his arms lie like limp fish at his sides.

“Is there any place we can talk in private?”  She whispers into his ear.

He nods, then gestures to the stairs.  Credence watches them from the kitchen, brow furrowed with too deep lines.  Graves sends him a thin lipped smile, but that only seems to make him frown harder.

He climbs onto the second step, then the fourth, without a thought, then the fifth and sixth like normal.  A soft popping noise, and he feels a light rush of air caress his neck, like a window was opened somewhere in the brownstone.  It’s followed by the sound of something shattering, and Graves looks up to Credence who wears an expression of complete, and utter horror, and whose mug lies in pieces at his feet.  Graves frowns at the puddle of tea slowly soaking into the floorboards.

“Oh.”  He remembers, turning around.  “Watch the first st-”

The staircase is empty.  The foyer is empty, and Seraphina is nowhere to be seen.

Graves blinks.

“Sera?”

**Author's Note:**

> Leave a comment if you like, I know I like comments a whole lot, a whooooole lot


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